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Wen | Jiang Xu
A child's wise mind can heal many of life's traumas, but I can't find a moment of self-detachment. - "Detachment"
A friend once said that life is a gift of life itself, and only love can transcend it. After watching the American movie "Detachment", I remembered this sentence.
On the surface, the film Beyond explores the issue of education by telling the story of the dire situation of a school. If we go deeper, we can see that it actually takes the male protagonist Henry as the point and takes Henry's school as the surface, showing the diverse lives of different ages and different social classes, and the various spiritual dilemmas within these lives are expressed in a lyric: How should I exist?
The existentialist philosopher Sartre believes that man falls into the world like a seed by accident, and the world is absurd and life is painful. Is it possible to be born as a human being only to drift in the midst of absurdity, painfully and numbly, for a period of time, until it is extinguished?
We are blessed to be given life, and it is not enough to allow it to exist. When we think about how to exist, we are actually exploring the way out of transcendence. What we need to transcend is the fate of the unchosen, the trauma of life, the loneliness of not being understood.
Some people commented that the title of the film "Beyond" is not worthy of the name, because it makes people feel depressed and heavy, and even called it a "disaster film". And I clearly felt the warmth brought by the goodness of human nature while suppressing the heaviness.
What is destiny?
In the past, my understanding of the word "destiny" was very vague, and the increase in life experience made me understand that the so-called fate is the rendering of a person's childhood and even the entire life background of the parents, the original family, and the growth environment that cannot be selected at birth.
One of the artistic features of the film "Detachment" is to insert the consciousness that flashes in the mind of the male protagonist Henry at any time into his real life, so that the two are unevenly presented. By connecting bits and pieces of consciousness, we get a rough idea of his fate:
Henry's grandfather may have molested his daughter after getting drunk, and then gave birth to Henry. When Henry was seven years old, his mother could not bear the internal torture and committed suicide by taking medicine. Since then, Henry and his grandfather have lived on each other and grown up alone.
Such a fate, such a distorted family environment, allowed Henry to develop a self-enclosed personality, as Grandpa said: "You always say that you are good, but I know that you hide your heart, you are always self-enclosed, you have been like this since childhood." 」 "The innate destiny creates a character that is born so, and is born with such a character, and guides the words and deeds of daily life.
As a teacher, Henry did not work in a school, and he changed schools frequently as a substitute teacher. This is done to avoid emotional communication with others. The sensitive student was able to catch a glimpse of him, who always looked sad.
At the school known as the "garbage student shelter", Henry was a charismatic teacher. In the face of students who are not inferior, he quietly reassures, in the face of pessimistic and negative learning, he enlightens in a good way, and in the face of students who abuse animals, he educates calmly. In short, he is a strong teacher, a peaceful and friendly colleague, and a handsome and gentle bachelor.
However, when he gets on the bus that no one knows, he will burst into tears while thinking about his fate and the existence of this fate.
Henry longed to go beyond. He treated his grandfather with tolerance until his death; he taught the stubborn students with great patience and love; he pulled her back to the right path with compassion for the prostitutes he met on the street corner. This kind of unsparing love and help is a guide for others, but not a salvation for himself?
Fate is like an umbrella that envelops Henry in it, always reflecting the shadow of his heart.
Fate is also like a land, no matter where you go, you can't get rid of its gravity.
Writer Wang Zengqi said: "Everyone carries a lifetime of history, half a month of mourning, walking on the street. The wind intertwines the busy, panicked, lonely and mediocre life of each of us. ”
Henry is so, so are the people around him, why aren't people in real life like this?
The principal of this school, who seems to be a dignified and majestic strong woman, in fact, she has to bear the pressure of her own dismissal, the school is broken up, and when she reaches middle age, she still has to face the crisis of marriage silently. Curled up on the office floor, tearful, she announced the last staff meeting to the megaphone. Who can see her helplessness and bitterness?
The young provost, faced with a rebellious girl who could not listen to persuasion, felt bitter, and the hatred of iron and steel made her emotionally collapse and emit unseemly hysterical cries. In exchange for what? A sentence of You are sick. Who can understand her inadequacy?
A male teacher, back at his cold home, his wife looked down at her mobile phone, there was no food in the pot, and there was no love in her heart. He took the test paper out of his bag and was greeted by the student writing "You rotten man" on the test paper. He came back downstairs from work and often sat in the car for a long time. Who can read his henchmen?
In order to survive, Erica, a prostitute, serves men on the bus without being paid and is humiliated. Afterwards, she followed Henry out of the car, questioning why he didn't step up to help her, and even shamelessly said that he could provide free services. Who can understand her past and tolerate her depravity?
In short, men, women and children carry unspeakable sorrow and trauma brought by life. Everyone encounters the chaos and trivialities of life, and they all have their own problems.
Some people are lucky enough to meet the help of noble people to grow and surpass. Some people are not so lucky, and can only chew the bitter fruit of life alone, shrinking in dark corners and licking the wounds caused by the flood beasts.
Henry has this section:
"We need something to help us detach ourselves from the complexity of reality, to think more or less about the causes of these problems, to think more or less about how to get out of the sea of suffering of all sentient beings."
I think these things can be art, they can be philosophy, they can be religion. With the help of these things, we jump out at the right time, look down on life from the perspective of a bystander, look at the world with an ethereal and detached state of mind, and face life with a playful and appreciative attitude. Maybe you'll find out that everything isn't that bad.
My soul is so far away from me, and my existence is so real.
This famous quote of the existentialist writer Camus was placed at the beginning of the film and laid the foundation of the whole film.
Henry at work, like one of his students' paintings, stands in an empty classroom with a blank face. Evil, this blankness and emptiness, as he said in his inner monologue as he walked down the street at night: "I have never been blunt about my feelings, I have treated myself truthfully, I am young and old, even my soul is bored to the extreme, many times, I have lost my expression, I am like you." 」 ”
The student who painted this painting was called Meredith. She was fat and untrimmed, so she was often ridiculed by her classmates. She loves photography and likes to see the dark side of everyone's heart with a keen eye— sadness, resentment, loneliness, loneliness, sadness, and capture these expressions.
If encouraged and guided, her talents should be better developed. Unfortunately, Meredith's misfortune is that she was ridiculed by her classmates at school and criticized by her parents when she returned home. They constantly scolded her for not losing weight, why she had been doing these gloomy things all day, what was the use of these things. They never reflect: Why is the child in such a state?
In the end, Meredith chose to commit suicide in front of teachers and students by swallowing homemade poisoned cakes. Death, she thought, was detachment. As she puts it in the video: "Some people say that suicide is a panacea for their troubles. "Perhaps, she is brave, but in fact she is cowardly, because she lacks the courage to face life positively.
After experiencing more life and death parting, Henry has a feeling: as an individual in the world, he is insignificant, and many times, he does not know how to exist. He said to his female colleague, "You can see me, but all you see is the shell." ”
Everyone craves love, but is used to seeing the world with the naked eye. Only to see the shell is doomed to fail to understand. If you can't understand it, you will fall into the mire of loneliness.
Writer Zhou Guoping said: "Loneliness is a gift of love. Perhaps, only by opening your heart and learning to understand and accept others can you activate the source of love.
The sea of life, the transcendence of fate, the transcendence of life trauma, and the transcendence of loneliness are the lessons to be done in Henry's life, and it is also the practice of each of us in the world.
[Author's profile: Jiang Xu, a post-80s woman, is a signed author of Ten Point Reading. Cook words to cure hunger, borrow a pen to draw the heart. Has published "Li Qingzhao: Wine poetry who shares". Click "Follow" in the top right corner to watch more related content. 】